ARTICLES ABOUT EMERGENCY ROOM BY DATE - PAGE 2

Maryland is on the right track in trying to do something to cut hospital costs ("Hospitals uneasy over rate plan," April 7). A state proposal would establish a plan to tie medical spending to the growth of the economy. The plan, according to your story, "is making hospital executives uneasy. " Well, let me tell those executives that their present hospital costs are making me uneasy. In early March, I had an allergic reaction to "Z-pack," an antibiotic prescribed for a virus that had been diagnosed as a bacterial infection I suffered for three days with no appetite and little sleep and finally had to go to the emergency room at Greater Baltimore Medical Center.

Gov. Martin O'Malley's gun control bill faces a crucial test this week, when it is expected to receive committee votes in the House of Delegates. Although the legislation passed the Senate with strong support - and despite polling showing the vast majority of Marylanders approve of its key elements - it has produced some grumbling in the House, and not just from Republicans, who have stood unified in opposition to the measure. Lawmakers are likely to consider a host of amendments to the legislation, some of which are reasonable and some of which are not. Perhaps the trickiest area of the legislation is the standard it sets for who, by virtue of mental illness, should be prevented from buying a gun. Existing state law prohibits purchases by those who are found not criminally responsible or incompetent to stand trial because of mental illness - those provisions are not controversial - and anyone who has spent 30 consecutive days in an inpatient mental health facility.

Carl Edgell doesn't enjoy going to the hospital. But he doesn't want to hurt anyone, either. The 44-year-old homeless man has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. At times when he has felt that he has reached a breaking point, he has taken himself to a local emergency room. Each time, he says, the experience has been different. When he has been referred to a psychiatric unit, he says, he has found the physicians and nurses "compassionate.

Nearly 10,000 people in West Baltimore are diagnosed each year with new cases of diabetes, hypertension and other treatable, chronic health conditions — enough to fill 24 jumbo jets. These illnesses will kill many of them and complications will disable others who may end up in wheelchairs or have limbs amputated because they didn't get the proper medical care. This is the evidence the West Baltimore Primary Care Access Collaborative, a coalition of 16 hospitals and nonprofit organizations, gave state health officials as they sought to join a state program that provides financial incentives in an effort to curb health disparities in the state through the creation of special zones.

Bryan Johnson didn't know he had bipolar disorder until he ended up at the emergency room, where he assaulted a police officer. His family had taken him to the University of Maryland Medical Center because he was acting strangely, staring into the distance and constantly pacing as he struggled with the death of his brother and the loss of his job. He was sent to Central Booking as soon as he was released from the hospital, and wound up with a...

Area hospitals are coping with a surge of patients with achy bodies, fevers and sore throats as the nation grapples with a flu season that has hit earlier and harder than usual. The flu virus is unpredictable, so no one knows when the outbreak will peak or how bad the season will be, but a doctor said the pieces are in place to potentially make it one of the worst influenza seasons in recent years. The principal strain infecting people this year is one generally associated with more severe symptoms, said Dr. Andrea Dugas, an emergency room physician at Johns Hopkins Hospital who is leading research on the flu virus.

It is unbelievably sad that Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher killed his girlfriend and then himself ("The tragedy of Jovan Belcher," Dec. 4). The couple had a 3-month-old baby, and it's heart-wrenching when something like this happens. It brings me to tears every time I think of it because it didn't have to end this way. Severe mental illness does not have to end in suicide and murder for the victims and pain for those left behind. Sadly, men are more likely to use lethal weapons like guns when they attempt suicide.

I woke Thanksgiving morning to text messages from my sisters. Happy Thanksgiving, they said. My daughter sent a text saying she was jumping in the shower and would be leaving shortly to help me cook. I texted pictures of my dining room table, set with flowers and linens for Thanksgiving dinner. After dinner, I texted pictures of all the dirty dishes. My sister texted a picture of her Christmas tree, and her kids all texted her to say it looked great. I know, because I was copied in on the texting.

During Anne Arundel Community College's emergency department simulation, nursing professor Kathy Jo Keever played a patient brought to an emergency room after falling from a tree stand while trying to shoot a 14-point buck. After having her belongings - including a crushed beer can and fake pistol - removed, she was wheeled into a chaotic, crowded ER: Every patient bed was taken, some occupied by mannequins with voice commands, while an actress patient pleaded for pain medication.

The rapid decline in health and ultimate death of a woman from fungal meningitis at Johns Hopkins Hospital after she'd received a tainted steroid injection was outlined by a team of Hopkins doctors in a medical journal article released online Thursday. The article, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, says a 51-year-old woman arrived at a local emergency room at the end of August with a headache "radiating" from the back of her head to her face. She'd received the steroid injection a week earlier.